Human Rights in Pakistan With Special Focus Bonded Labour

This study explores the issue of human rights of bonded labor and women in Pakistan. Bonded labor and women are very weak segments of our policy focus and empirical research. The study provides new insights into the thematic exploration in a qualitative study. The data was accessed through interviews, witnesses and oral opinions from the respondents. Meetings, observations and informal methods of data collection were also used. This has focused to investigate how, when and where human rights of bonded/fortified workers have been violated. The study provides a theoretical perspective on the roots and history of human rights. Human Rights can be defined as the most inalienable rights of the people ensured by the constitution and safeguarded by the judiciary and criminal justice system. Human rights in Islam are derived from the Will of God. God has created humans equally and there is no discrimination on the basis of caste, creed and color. However, before Allah the righteous are highly valued. No political authority but Allah alone has sole power of governing the rights of global humanity. The Human Rights of laboring class is highly challenging theme especially in context of Pakistan. Pakistan belongs to kind of a country where millions of people are undergoing hard labor. There are substantial pockets of laboring in all provinces of Pakistan. The earliest theorists like Karl Marx and Mex Weber meticulously focused on laboring perspective, labor economy, capitalistic injustices and low wages of laboring population. Capitalists have created an unequal structure for the poorest classes enabling powerful class to control their fate. Social and economic structures thus created will never secure and protect the laboring population on any part of the globe. World would be never stable without balancing the inequitable resources. Slavery and labor victimization are continued all over the world in various forms and manifestations. Country like Pakistan is no exception to the bitter scenario. This study is conducted in provinces of Sindh, Punjab and Baluchistan on the laboring in the context of their human rights status. Interviews, witness opinions, case-profiles and secondary information were utilized in the study. As research design the study included data collected from twenty one (21) districts along with information related to twenty six (26) districts of Baluchistan. The study focused the eleven (11) localities from Sindh province and seven (7) regions of Balouchistan. Further, the field study included its activity to talking to respondents (52 percent) of area of Sindh and twenty seven (27) belonging to Baluchistan. Women have been symbolized as commodity for male members in tribal structure. Women are considered Zar (wealth) which is possessed by men. There are terms like Zar (wealth), Zamin (land) and Zan (woman) which actually portray and reflect how we treat our women. Women face all sorts of sacrifices when revenges/enmities are settled. (Mehdi, 2000) It is very complex to investigate the issue of Bonded labor in Pakistan due to several constraints rooted in culture, society and political milieu. It is very difficult to know and address the slavery and servitude in Pakistan. Asian Development Bank has indicated a significant volume of destitution and slavery occurring in Sindh and Baluchistan. People are bonded by strongers and kept in captivation. Labor violations in Sindh are deep-rooted in land holdings and nature of distribution of lands. There is very high number of landless farmers in Sindh. Punjab has proprietorship on seven sections of land and Sindh has possession on twenty eight sections of land. International Labor Organization (ILO) depicts 1.8 million people who are involved in fortified work in Pakistan while majority of them are landless peasants found in Sindh. Today, Sindh has the most elevated rate of landlessness in Pakistan. More than 40 percent of the area in Sindh is tenanted out by enormous proprietors. There are about 1.2 million who are fortified in work along with their women and children. Sindh Tenancy Act has failed to protect the purview- fortified workers. The Bonded Labor Abolition Act has also failed to abolish Bonded Labor in Pakistan. Female babies born from age one to four are highly susceptible to death, disease and malnutrition. Women are highly victimized physically in South East Asia besides hindering them in development role. Women are denied access to human rights in rural areas in the study region and its purview. Children are engaged/forced/involved. Fate of women are settled by tribal jirga laws which have no statutory status in Pakistani laws but are popularly practiced in backward areas of Pakistan. Killing and other serious issues related to women are settled by family or tribal chief reviewed by tribesmen. Human societies still face grave issues of poor-child rearing, poor nutrition, forced labour, lack of sanitation and illiteracy. Girls face more severe social challenges in poor families and regions. The study concluded that seventy (70) percent rural women and eighty (80) percent urban women are thought inferior to men comparatively. Popularly; women are born for social bondage and marriage. Female babies born from age one to four are highly susceptible to death, disease and mal-nutrition. Women are highly victimized physically in South East Asia besides hindering them in development role. Women are denied access to human rights in rural areas in the study region and its purview. Children are engaged/forced/involved the activities in which children are employed are hazardous, including rag picking, leather tanning, coal mining, deep-sea fishing, brick making, carpet weaving, and manufacturing surgical instruments and glass bangles. Children working in the glass bangle sector are exposed to high temperatures, unstable material, fumes, and sharp objects. Children working in the tannery sector are exposed to toxic chemicals, and those working in the brick sector lift heavy loads. Children working in carpet-weaving suffer eye and lung diseases due to unsafe working conditions. Child miners, child domestics, and other working children who are far from their families are particularly vulnerable to sexual abuse. ‣ Bonded child labor reportedly exists in the coal, brick, and carpet industries. Some children working in mining, domestic service, and agriculture are from families who are bonded or indebted to their employers. Commercial sexual exploitation of children continues to be a problem. Children are trafficked within Pakistan for the purposes of sexual exploitation and bonded labor. Girls are trafficked internationally for forced labor. ‣There are reports of children being kidnapped, maimed, and forced to work as beggars. There also reports of children under the minimum voluntary recruitment age of 17 years being involved in armed conflict. Children below age of 14 are employed in hard labour and industrial work. This is pure violation of their human rights. Children are exposed to all types of harzards in Pakistan. Bonded labour is gross violation of law leading to maximum five years of prison and fine. International Law on children also prohibits trafficking of children and amounts to criminal implications for the offender. Prostitution of all kinds is globally prohibited by world laws and penal codes of all respective countries. There are no generally acknowledged figures for the quantity of reinforced youngster workers in India. Once more, Government''s dedication to general instruction and destitution annihilation projects have brought about noteworthy diminishing in number of reinforced works. In the customary commercial ventures of astounding hand-woven fabrics and painstaking work, expanded mindfulness by universal purchasers and stringent weighs put set up by multinational companies on their suppliers has brought about suppliers and producers to supplant reinforced tyke work by rather offering instructive offices to offspring of their representatives and laborers. Global Tourists to places like Rajasthan additionally have influence and have at commonly reported occurrences of tyke work to powers who quickly act to check any youngster work. Conversely, of 20 million fortified workers in Pakistan 7.5 million are youngsters." xml:lang="en_US